Omega Garden's Volksgarden Rotary Garden

[Vick074]

Thanks Max!
Read this whole journal, and I'm in.
Gotta start saving for a Volks.
Love everything about this setup.

Can't wait to watch another volksgrow.

 

[Propa Gator]

Vick, you may find this and other journals by WheeloFortune interesting and educational.

 

[VgAce]

Well I just finished with my first grow with the volksgarden. It was an utter failure. Of the ~40 plants that I started with only about 7 lasted until the end. I found it incredibly difficult to not overwater the small plants and then also not completely dry out the rockwool. I lost so many plants it was ridiculous. In the end I would say I have about 10g of bud. Yep only 10g of bud. I have shut down my volksgarden until I can get some fresh clones to try again but I am so far not at all impressed with this machine. And considering it cost me $2400 I am still waiting to get my return on my investment. Hopefully round 2 will be more kind.

 

[Vick074]

Damn!!
10 grams!?
Sorry to hear the wheel didn't bring you fortune on your first go.
I'm assuming you had your PPM's, PH, and temps dialed in your res throughout the grow?
Did you ever use a wetting agent? like SM-90 to help with water retention in the rockwool?
Maybe start a journal here with the next round, so some of the amazing people here at 420 magazine can help if needed!
Plus, I'll bet a lot of people are dying to experience another rotary grow here!

 

[VgAce]

I am trying to figure out exactly what went wrong. What would SM-90 do to the Rockwool?

And I also did not use any Silica. It seems like that is essential as the plants are constantly rotating.

 

[Vick074]

SM-90 is a called a wetting agent, but its primary use is to prevent or treat bacteria, fungus and insect problems either by medium drench or foliar spray.
Silica would definitely help strengthen the plant's structure, toughens them up.
I use it all the time.

I'm interested in how everything else was in your grow?
Like I asked before, PH? PPM's? res temps?
what about the nutes you used?
how often were you feeding?
when you say you lost most of the plants, what symptoms did they have before they died?
There's just too many factors to narrow it down without you answering some questions first.

 

[VgAce]

Ok I will try and answer all of your questions. Thank you in advance for helping me. In the beginning my plants suffered because I was not able to get the machine running because of a key part not being shipped with the original machine. So even tho I had clones ready to go I was unable to put them into the machine. This stressed them a lot.

The Nutes I used were GH Flora Nova and Flora Bloom. I also used Floralicious Plus and sometimes Rapid Start. I did not even know about Silica. At first it was easy to overwater my plants because I was turning on the pump once a day. That is what this original thread stated to do. That must be a typo because the Rockwool soaks up so much water that you only need to turn in on once or twice a week. So my clones were stressed even more because they were overwatered. By the time I figured this out about 50% were dead.

I did not PPM or PH the water either. I just added the nutes to Tap water and let it get soaked up.

Next time i am going to start with fresh clones and add Silica Si by GH.

 

[Vick074]

Ok I will try and answer all of your questions. Thank you in advance for helping me. In the beginning my plants suffered because I was not able to get the machine running because of a key part not being shipped with the original machine. So even tho I had clones ready to go I was unable to put them into the machine. This stressed them a lot.

The Nutes I used were GH Flora Nova and Flora Bloom. I also used Floralicious Plus and sometimes Rapid Start. I did not even know about Silica. At first it was easy to overwater my plants because I was turning on the pump once a day. That is what this original thread stated to do. That must be a typo because the Rockwool soaks up so much water that you only need to turn in on once or twice a week. So my clones were stressed even more because they were overwatered. By the time I figured this out about 50% were dead.

I did not PPM or PH the water either. I just added the nutes to Tap water and let it get soaked up.

Next time i am going to start with fresh clones and add Silica Si by GH.

Ok, now that you've answered some key questions hopefully now we can get to the nitty gritty..
First of all hearing that you did not PH or PPM anything has me baffled.
And I'm pretty sure this has about 75% to do with your grow not succeeding.
You are running a full hydro setup with the Volks, so not knowing how PH or PPM's are in your res is putting you at a huge disadvantage. And who's to say that you have good tap water? you could have 500 PPM out of the tap for all you know, so knowing what kind of water you are working with also plays a part. If I were running that thing I'd be using RO water at every res change..
The first thing you should be investing some money in before you fire that thing back up again, is a PH pen, a PPM pen, calibration solution (PH4, and PH7), and some PH up and PH down. Another thing you're missing is Cal Mag. Just using Flora Nova isn't going to have enough Calcium and Magnesium so supplementation in a void medium like Rockwool is needed.
I don't know a single person that does hydro and isn't religious about keeping their PH and PPM's in check.
Things can just shift too far in either direction and kill your grow.
Using Rapid start is good because keeping your roots happy in those rockwool cubes is one of the most important parts.
But watering too much in those cubes can give you root rot and again kill your grow.

Another thing to think about is what strain you were running.
Indica dominant strains do the best in rotary gardens because they don't stretch as much as Sativa's.
Finding a strain that has nice short internodes is key.
I'd suggest finding a good mother first, then cloning yourself.
That way you can be a one man show.
Having to buy enough clones to fill that thing every time can get really damn expensive.
Also having the power to run your Mother and clones under a GLR lighting schedule will help to keep them from stretching too much when you do flip to 12/12 plus save you a bit on the electricity bill.

I have to ask a few more questions though,
-what were temperatures where you were growing?
-what was the RH?
-did you have airstones in your res?
-what kind of light were you running through the tube?

I think you should start a journal up when you're ready.
There is so many amazing hydro growers on here that will be able to guide you through your second run, and have you turning out big ass buds over and over!

 

[VgAce]

Ok well I did have the PPM and PH meter that I use on my mother plants. I just didn't do that before I fed the plants. So I will adjust that next time. Also my PPM out of the Tap is about 95. If I filter the water it drops down.

What do you mean about RH? What is that?

The temps in my room were room temperature. I try and keep it pretty cool but not cold in my grow room. I have the volksgarden in a 4 foot by 4 foot grow tent. With mushroom bags hanging from the top for the C02.

I had a 600 MH for the veg, and then switched to a 600 W MH for the bloom.

And I have about 50 clones going right now so once they pop roots i will put them in the machine.

 

[Keith Lake]

Ok well I did have the PPM and PH meter that I use on my mother plants. I just didn't do that before I fed the plants. So I will adjust that next time. Also my PPM out of the Tap is about 95. If I filter the water it drops down.

What do you mean about RH? What is that?

The temps in my room were room temperature. I try and keep it pretty cool but not cold in my grow room. I have the volksgarden in a 4 foot by 4 foot grow tent. With mushroom bags hanging from the top for the C02.

I had a 600 MH for the veg, and then switched to a 600 W MH for the bloom.

And I have about 50 clones going right now so once they pop roots i will put them in the machine.

RH = relative humidity. Relative, meaning the absolute moisture in the air is dependent on the temperature. Hotter air holds far more moisture than cold air. If you google hygrometer chart you'll see a visual representation of this,

It's important to keep the RH high during vegetative growth (I.e >50%). The lower the better during flowering since moist air facilitates mold.

I'd like to chime in and say that in hydro it's really important to track your PH and total solids (measured in ppm).

I've been fascinated by the Volks method since it came out, and have a couple links to highly successful grows in my blog. I mean no disrespect but feel the need to say that this is an advanced growing method and one that is ideal for limited space, quick turnover where plant count is not a concern. I'd recommend people get at least one DWC or equivalent hydro grow under their below before attempting.

 

[VgAce]

I did have a normal DWC setup going but when I heard about all the success the person who started this thread had, I was instantly wanting one. I understand that it is an advanced setup but I know I can get it to work. I just don't know exactly what it is that i did wrong other than PHing the nutes before I gave them to the plants.

 

[Keith Lake]

I did have a normal DWC setup going but when I heard about all the success the person who started this thread had, I was instantly wanting one. I understand that it is an advanced setup but I know I can get it to work. I just don't know exactly what it is that i did wrong other than PHing the nutes before I gave them to the plants.

Wild love to see you do a grow journal so the experts could follow along and offer advice.

I don't know what didn't work for you but I get the impression you overwatered (letting a plant go dry is important because it causes the roots to grow and stretch as they seek out water. I do know that hydro can have wild ph swings as the plant's needs change and they take different mutes from the reservoir at different times.

 

[VgAce]

Ok So I have started up a new grow in the volksgarden after some dismal failures with cloning. So far the plants are looking ok but the main problem i am seeing is that all of the leaves are drooping. They are not standing straight up like they should. Could this be heat stress or overwatering?

 

[Vick074]

could be both..
What are your temps?
And when you water, are the cubes dry or still wet?

 

[VgAce]

So I have started up again and am already having problems. I am starting to think buying this thing was a $2500 mistake. I have started a grow journal. Here is the link: Volksgarden Grow Attempt #2

 

[Spacebomb]

Nice!

 

[phatchance]

I wanted to post pics of my new Volksgarden Supra to this thread, and I wasn't able to upload a photo. I watched the How To video, and I noticed that the button for uploading that makes the magic happen didn't show up for me. I looked in the FAQs to see if there was a minimum number of posts required before images can be uploaded, but I didn't see any such reference. Can anyone enlighten me?

The Volksgarden® Supra™ Stacker

 

[Richard Richardson]

If you are using Internet Explorer, we have a fix here - Internet Explorer Browser Issues - Solution

 

[GartenbauMio]

Hi...
what's that glass-tube around the light for?
Planning to build one myself.
Thanks for sharing your knowlege : )

cheers

 

[TorturedSoul]

It's a cool-tube (-type) setup. There is a fan blowing air through that glass tube for heat removal purposes. Otherwise, those buds might have gotten a little crunchy, lol. Secondary use: Just in case the odd drip falls from a plant when it is at/near the top of the rotation, it will not cause the bulb to shatter.